Short term training support is requested for 12 optometry students during the summers after their first, second or third year of optometry school. The training will be conducted by established vision science and clinical science researchers, primarily members of the Group in Vision Science, from a variety of departments on the U.C. Berkeley campus (e.g. optometry, psychology, molecular and cell biology, biomedical and environmental health sciences). Each trainee will be engaged in a minimum of two separate short term training periods (summers) over a two year period following completion of their first year of optometry school. Students able to complete a third year of training will be encouraged to do so. The training program is designed to attract talented students to clinical research by developing their interest, awareness and enthusiasm for a career in biomedical or behavioral research. Training will be provided within the laboratories of 26 mentors on the U.C. Berkeley campus where, currently, 35 predoctoral students and approximately 12 postdoctoral fellows are involved in the Graduate Program in Vision Science. (This group training program, in existence for over 50 years on the Berkeley campus, has graduated more than 100 trainees with advanced degrees -- the majority now actively engaged in vision research. In the past 15 years, the program has attracted many clinicians to its Ph.D. training program (over 20 with O.D. degrees from U.C. Berkeley alone). This Ph.D. and postdoctoral training program wishes to broaden its scope to include short term training of optometry students already enrolled in a clinical training Program. The program has the unusual opportunity to identify all of the eligible minority trainees on a personal basis as well as focus its attention on the optometry school in Puerto Rico, whose students are entirely minority (Hispanic). In addition, optometry schools from across the country will be encouraged to support our efforts to attract talented health profession students to our short term training program. [unreadable] [unreadable]